Code name, p.12
Code Name, page 12
Well, everyone except people like Roland Gates.
As much as she went over it in her mind, she couldn’t figure out how all this trouble started. She was just an intelligence analyst, one of many who processed paperwork. And so was Mark. They were never involved in high-level meetings or discussions about strategy. They knew none of the deep secret details about operations NIA had going on around the world.
How can this be, she asked herself, that I’m walking through a secret tunnel wearing handcuffs and Mark is being hunted by NIA? It was completely baffling to her.
Laura had seen the recent news broadcast about Lester Turnbull, drowning in a tangle of fishing line beneath his own boat. She had heard about others who had died in mysterious ways. In the past couple of years, several unfortunate accidents had taken the lives of people somehow related to NIA – a skiing mishap here, a car accident there, someone burned to death in his own bed, and most recently Lester Turnbull.
None of these incidents had attracted particular attention; they were just news items on the evening broadcast. But suddenly, she suspected that perhaps not all of those fatalities were truly accidents.
Laura’s thoughts turned to Elizabeth’s husband. It’s one thing for an undercover agent like Clive Mabrey to be assassinated by foreign agents. That was horribly unfortunate. Spy work is dangerous. If you’re going to play that game, you have to accept the risks.
But it was quite another thing for people inside the organization to be snuffed out by the company itself. This wasn’t a game in which foreign agents kill each other. It was nothing less than a sanctioned murder of innocent people by the very government they worked for and trusted.
At the thought of what was really happening, a wave of nausea swept over her, and Laura stumbled, collapsing to her knees. The handcuff nearly pulled Elizabeth off her feet before she realized what was happening.
“What the … Laura, what are you doing?”
Laura looked up with a grim expression, her face deathly pale and her whole body trembling. “You’re going to kill me, aren’t you … just like they’re trying to kill Mark?”
The older woman looked quickly away. Laura knew Elizabeth liked her. She had befriended her, and had been looking forward to the birth of her baby. Now the woman was under orders from Gates to get rid of her.
The reason for using this obscure tunnel to exit the building was so nobody inside NIA would see them leave together. Only the two guards knew, and they were part of the inner circle of Gates’ men. None of the rank-and-file employees would ever know where Laura went or what happened to her. Not until they read about her accidental death in the newspapers.
“You are, aren’t you?” Laura repeated.
Elizabeth knelt beside the trembling girl. “Laura—” she began, but was interrupted.
“Your own husband was killed. You told me he was a good man. Well, Mark is a good man, too. And I’m a good person. And this baby has done nothing wrong. None of us have. We don’t deserve to die. How can you do this?” she sobbed.
Elizabeth sat down next to Laura and heaved a great sigh. “After Clive was killed, I swore I would dedicate my life to NIA and to weeding out corruption in the agency. It was corrupt people who caused his death, people who sold information to the enemy.”
Suddenly there was a transformation. The softness in her voice disappeared and she looked at Laura with bitterness in her eyes. “People just like you and Mark, people who needed money and were willing to do anything to get it. They sold my husband’s life for money!” She half screamed the words, and a tear formed in her eyes. “And I’ve lived a lonely life ever since. He was everything to me, and he was taken from me because of greed. I’ll never let that happen again. Now get up. You aren’t the only one with problems in her life.”
With that, Elizabeth stood up and yanked Laura to her feet. “Come on!” she commanded. She gave the younger woman a hard look, and headed off down the tunnel, pulling Laura by the handcuff.
The hard sound of their shoes against the expanded metal floor echoed off the concrete walls and ceiling; in the distance, dim daylight filtered into the tunnel, and the sound of rain began to compete with the sound of their walking.
The end of the tunnel came abruptly. Dense forest was all around the tunnel entrance, and the land gently fell away into a small canyon. A few yards from where the women stood was a gravel road and a dilapidated car that looked as if it had been abandoned.
Laura glanced at Elizabeth, but the older woman refused to look at her. Elizabeth studied the scene before her, looked left and right. Then she tugged at the handcuff and began walking toward the car.
“Let’s go!”
The doors were unlocked, and Elizabeth opened the passenger side door for Laura.
“Sit down,” she commanded. “These will have to come off.” She reached into her pocket for the key and unlocked her own wrist from the cuffs. Then she locked that cuff to a grab bar above the passenger side door.
Elizabeth slammed the door, then walked around to the driver’s side and got in. Above the sun visor was an ignition key, and Elizabeth started the engine without a word.
A rumble approached from the rear of the car, and Laura turned to see what it was. A convoy of army trucks thundered past and disappeared into the forest around a bend in the road.
Elizabeth Mabrey pulled the transmission lever into gear, turned the car around and drove in the opposite direction.
“Where are we going?”
Elizabeth stared straight ahead, refusing an answer. Her hands tightly gripped the steering wheel, her jaw was set and she seemed to be chewing, but there was nothing in her mouth. Laura could see that the woman was battling an enormous load of stress. Even though she was Elizabeth’s prisoner, she felt a certain sympathy for the woman.
“I’m sorry for you, Liz. You’re doing something that you know is terribly wrong.”
“Shut up!”
The words stung, especially coming from this woman who had been a friend. Laura turned her eyes to the scene outside the car, trying to figure out where they were, but she was lost.
When they finally came to a paved highway, they drove east then south. Laura knew where they were now, but it did her no good. There was not a thing in the world she could do to change the situation. So she sat quietly; the growl of a disintegrating exhaust system was the only sound that broke the silence.
After a while, the scene around her was familiar to Laura. One final turn put the car on the street where Laura and Mark’s apartment stood. But rather than drive to the apartment, Elizabeth pulled the car to the curb behind a van.
“Are you taking me home?” Laura asked in bewilderment.
“Just watch.”
Laura looked through the windshield at her apartment, a block away. In the fading light, it was hard to see exactly what was going on, but suddenly the silence was broken by the distant sound of sirens that seemed to be getting closer. In a few moments, two fire trucks turned the corner and pulled to a stop in front of her apartment. Then she saw it – smoke pouring from her apartment. Then flames.
“No,” she cried, straining against the handcuff.
“Shut up and watch,” the older woman scolded. “You fail to cooperate, and this is what happens. But I promise you, this is just the beginning.”
Laura sobbed as she watched the firemen seem to fumble their assignment and begin switching hoses around from one hydrant to another. Then she noticed three men carrying duffel bags leave the apartment and come toward them. The men threw their equipment in the van, climbed aboard and drove away.
Without another word, Elizabeth started the car, turned around in a driveway and drove in the opposite direction. Laura swung her head to watch the firemen, but tears blurred her vision. She wiped her eyes with the free hand and then stared at Elizabeth. The older woman seemed not to notice.
“You people are monsters,” Laura blurted.
Elizabeth did not respond, but kept both hands in a firm grip on the wheel and stared straight ahead. She reached down to turn on the car’s headlights, thumbed the turn signal to merge into traffic and blended into the heavy flow of vehicles traveling south on Interstate 95.
Somewhere during the second hour, Elizabeth tossed the handcuff key to Laura.
“You can take those off now.”
Laura was finally able to lower her right arm and rub her stiff shoulder. Her wrist was red and swollen and tender to the touch.
“Thank you,” she whispered, but got no reply. “I’m more than eight months pregnant. I’m not going anywhere.”
“You have no idea,” was all Elizabeth Mabrey said.
Through the night they drove south. The air became increasingly muggy. Without a map, Laura couldn’t tell where they were. She and Mark had never traveled the South, so she was unfamiliar with the names of towns they passed through.
They stopped only for fuel and then drove on. The door handle on Laura’s side had been removed, so she couldn’t easily get out of the car. Bathroom stops were made under Elizabeth’s tight supervision, and only when no other people were around.
The storm was far behind them now. They had driven from under the blackness of the clouds and into the blackness of night.
This day that had begun so well had plunged into blackness in every way. Her husband was a hunted man. She was accused of something terrible that she had absolutely no knowledge of. Her former friend had turned against her. And now she had no hope for herself or her baby.
In the silent darkness, Laura thought of Mark. Where are you? Are you okay?
The note he had left on the bench, folded in his familiar way, said XO. It was a code. An instruction that now was the time for them to drop out of sight, for their lives were in danger.
The prearranged plan they had worked out long before was that they would fade into invisibility and go to a predetermined place. If the situation demanded, and they were not able to be together, they would each find a way to reach the rendezvous point separately.
That was exactly what had happened. Now she hoped that Mark was still free and able to escape to their secret spot. Several possible places had been chosen, and each had been assigned a code. Sandi Jamison had mentioned that Mark wanted to meet Laura at their usual lunch spot, but now Laura knew that was only to get her to the couch where she would find the note and the code. The X indicated the first letter in the name of the rendezvous spot. The O signified an island. From among all the possibilities, Mark had chosen Xulakan.
She thought about the plan. No matter how well they had laid out their strategy, things were not going as they had hoped. Their apartment had been destroyed. Mark was being hunted by an army of men. She was a captive in Elizabeth Mabrey’s custody, on her way to a certain death that would be made to look accidental. It was all too much for her to bear.
Somewhere in the night, somewhere deep in the south, Laura fell asleep. Being in the advanced months of pregnancy was a drain on her strength. The events of the day had been enormously stressful. She finally ran out of energy, slumped against the door and fell into a deep sleep.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Pages 8–15, notebook #2
March 25
Morning on Xulakan had not fully come when Mark arrived at the hut once more to continue telling me his story. He was agitated, about what I had no idea. He entered the hut and sat abruptly on the hammock. Not wishing to become any part of his irritation, I grabbed my writing materials and took notes as he dictated.
“A chill breeze blew through the trees. The rain had stopped, but the wind following the storm was sweeping the forest, stripping leaves and even small twigs off the tops of trees.
“The darkness of the storm was gradually being replaced by the approach of evening. I had no time to lose. The National Guard search teams had passed me by. I strained to hear evidence of anyone in the immediate area. There was no sound except the wind. I was less than a half-mile into the forest. NIA headquarters was fewer than 900 yards away.
“For me to move back into the heart of the operation would be an unexpected strategy, with nobody looking for me there. Choppers, once they lifted off with their infrared scanners, wouldn’t begin searching that close to headquarters because they would be picking up readings from all the ground troops and the regular employees moving around in the parking lot. The place was in chaos, which would work to my advantage.
“Satisfied that the area was clear, I descended to the ground, pulled on my socks and laced my shoes. Even though I was careful to avoid leaving footprints on the ground as visible evidence of my passing, I knew I was leaving a clear trail, easy to follow, as soon as the tracking dogs were brought into the process.
“There was nothing I could do to eliminate my scent from every place my feet touched the ground. The dog-handlers would allow the dogs to sniff something of mine that had been taken from my office or car, and the animals would key on that scent and follow it until they found me. My only hope was to be out of the area when the dogs began their search. Then I had to work on masking my natural scent in a way that would break the link to my escape route.”
****
Mark assumed that the dogs would begin their search at NIA headquarters, follow Mark’s original trail into the forest beyond the fence, and track him to the tree. There would be a delay while the canopy was searched.
If he followed his original trail back to the fence, exactly the way he had come, that trail would become a dead-end, confuse the handlers. Dogs can’t tell if a person is coming or going on a single trail, all they know is that the scent is present there. They would get to the tree and stop and bay and howl into the canopy.
Mark figured the handlers would use a bull horn to yell into the tree, warning that he had been found and should come out and give himself up because it was no use hiding anymore. With no response, someone would climb the tree. With guns drawn, aimed upward, they would assume that Mark was still concealed among the branches. When that proved false, more men would be called in to make a thorough and time-consuming search of that vicinity, trying to pick up the trail again.
All buying Mark valuable time.
His scent was naturally going to be found all over the NIA parking lot, because he came and went every day. Finding his scent there would only confuse matters, slowing things down, not leading anywhere in particular. Still, he knew that eventually they would pick up his trail as it left the parking lot.
To Mark, the dogs presented a greater threat than the helicopters, infrared and night vision scopes. The electronic approach to a search is non-discriminating. It will sense anyone regardless of who he is. But a tracking dog will zero in on one individual, and will not give up once it gets on a trail.
Even though the heavy rains helped confuse the animals, Mark knew he eventually had to positively break his scent trail and leave the dogs helpless. But for right now, he had to get back inside the NIA perimeter before the dogs were brought in. And he was running against the clock.
The search was young. Mark knew troops were still moving away from him in the direction toward the outer perimeter, beating the brush and establishing what they believed to be a clean zone behind them. But a few hours from now, when that phase of the hunt had been declared a failure, the dogs would be brought in.
The plan was to begin at the fence to try to pick up his trail, with the clean zone being scoured by a second team; then helicopters overhead, with observers using binoculars. After dark, the dogs and their handlers would still be at work, aided by choppers turning on their infrared and night vision equipment. Unless Mark was found, the search would escalate very quickly.
****
“I followed my original trail back toward the fence,” Mark continued, “arriving a little faster than expected. I stopped short and crawled under a low bush, where I could see what was going on without being observed. The parking lot was in chaos.
“It was quitting time. Employees were making their way to their cars and heading out. Olive drab deuce-and-a-half trucks were parked helter-skelter. Uniformed soldiers were running about, either barking orders or following them. A state trooper was standing beside his car, lights flashing, carrying on a spirited conversation with someone. Arms were waving, voices were loud, tempers were flaring.
“Every car was being searched as it left the parking lot. Traffic was stacking up at the front gate, doors were opened, trunk lids lifted and contents inspected. Only a few employee cars remained unoccupied. From where I lay in the bushes, I could see Roland Gates’ Mercedes, Elizabeth Mabrey’s Lincoln, and … Laura’s Ford Escort.
“So, there it was. Laura had made it back from her doctor’s visit and was somewhere inside the NIA building, along with Mabrey and Gates. I could only wonder what was happening, and it troubled me to the depth of my heart that I had left her in such a precarious position. I felt like a coward, lying there under the concealment of a bush while my pregnant wife was a captive inside the building, probably undergoing a terrible routine of interrogation.
“My immediate impulse was to get back inside the building and rescue my wife. But even as the thought formed, I knew it would be doomed to failure. It would, in fact, result in the sure deaths of both of us.
“I knew that as long as I remained free, they would probably try to use Laura as bait to draw me in, which meant she was safe.”
I could tell that Mark was suffering with the telling of this part of the story, so I put my pencil down and offered my thoughts. “That would seem like the logical thing.”
“Yeah, but knowing Gates’ reputation, and knowing that he had killed his own partner in Afghanistan, I couldn’t be certain of anything,” Mark said. “That man was as unpredictable and ruthless as a trapped rattler. The code name Viper had been well chosen.”
